The General's Legacy

Chapter Nine: Homecoming and Failure (final part 2)

The Scout Commander stared into the fire on the remains of the royal palace in Tranmure. The flames reflected in his brown eyes did not curl restlessly like a wood fire. They shimmered, danced and crackled with impatience. The booming roars of the explosions still echoed in his mind making him flinch involuntarily when he thought of them. It was the sound of his failure and he never failed. His Scout network was too robust, thoroughly background checked and as undetectable as anyone could make it. He knew how to pick his scouts. He knew their life histories, their family, their family connections, friends and their family connections. He knew how to get answers from people when they didn't even know they were being questioned. He knew how to uncover people's weaknesses and fears to ensure they couldn't be used against him. Or he would move on and find another potential candidate.
He had a face no one remembered or a few remembered as something different from what it really was. A different face in every place. The face everyone expected or everyone ignored. He had voices to go with the faces. He was fluent in the old Ruberan language that Valendo and Emiria shared in all its dialects and accents. Fluent in the Nearhon language with all its tribal slants and idiosyncrasies.
Nothing could go wrong.
He thought of the mad window cleaning woman Prince, no King Sebastian was fixated by. He'd checked on her. She was from Ostenza, always was unstable, a lover jilted her at the altar, decided when it came to the crunch he couldn't cope with her whatever he might feel for the pretty smile. It sent her over the edge and wandering. His network had checked her right back to childhood. You can't fake that much crazy for that much time.
He had been taught by Emiria's finest and then offered the job of building Valendo's scout network. It was a unique opportunity to build a magnificent intelligence machine. Twenty years on the job so far, the first five far more challenging and frustrating than he had imagined. He started with nothing except what information came out of the Emirian network. He built while Nearhon continued its war. There had been setbacks, surprises and assassinations, but all were excusable while he was still building. There had been fifteen years of peace to perfect his machine, and perfect it was. A perfect failure.
There must be a weakness. Spying on the elected representatives and the royal family is forbidden. It is written into Valendo's new constitution. He didn't like it, but the representatives were under so much public scrutiny they could barely catch cold without someone knowing. The royal family were considered beyond suspicion, background known and lives watched with as much, if not more scrutiny as the elected representatives. And that constitution secured in the palace was now burned to ash and blown away by the wind.
The destruction of the palace, much of the royal family along with much of the military command was timed with the commanders annual dinner. Someone knew when. Too many people knew when, so no secret to uncover there.
There did not seem to be any leads to follow. He decided to wait in his child's hiding place in the bushes opposite the palace fire. A fitting hiding place for failure to sit. Few people came near the fires, and when they did it was the flames, they looked at.
'Patience. My job is not done.'
He would be patient and allow time to flow and ride its currents. Something would happen in time.
He closed his eyes and listened to his ally, the dark. The crackle and flurry of the fires masked much. But in time, the morning birdsong broke through and he listened to that. Birds moved if people came and changed their call. As the sky grew brighter many people moved and the birds retreated. He slowly and quietly took dried bread from inside his jacket and chewed on it. The sun broke between the mountain peaks bathing Tranmure in its light and warmth. An eclectic pair arrived in the palace courtyard. A wafting set of blue-green robes and a suit of armour with the all the stealth of scrap iron tossed down a flight of stairs. He heard Prince Cory coming above the noise of the fire. Zeivite performed one of his rituals reaching for the sky and then the ground. The flames finally dwindled and ceased their crackling dance. The silence seemed to shout in his ears. The ruined palace stonework still glowed like giant coals from a fire grate.
It occurred to him his hiding place was probably no longer a hiding place. How cautious was the mage today?
Zeivite turned around, his eyes locking with his peering out of the bushes. As cautious as anticipated. Mage's change all of the rules. The only way to hide from a mage's battle sense is in plain sight. He stood, the bushes no longer a useful hiding place.
"You must be hungry and thirsty hiding out here half the night, why don't you join us for breakfast?" Zeivite asked.
The Scout Commander didn't know whether to feel annoyed for being uncovered or the matter of fact way the question was toned. So he did what he planned to do and began to see where event currents would take him. Nodding once to each of the men he followed them as they left the palace courtyard. He kept a distance of ten paces behind them, mostly hidden in plain sight. Women dressed in their grey domestic working clothes hanging out washing in the newly arrived sunlight stopped to watch the robed mage and the prince in metal armour. Some even stopped midway through pinning their sheets to the line outside their houses to stare. None of them looked at a scout dressed like an outdoor servant. No one would pay attention to him except maybe another scout, and he was certain there were none of those near to see. After all, he would know, he was the perfect scout commander. He just needed to prove it again to his fiercest critic. The voice in his head that guided, checked and checked again everything he did. There was only one person he needed to prove his perfection to. The ever present man with the brown eyes that looked back out of the mirror at him.
'How would I have done this thing?'  he asked himself.
He let the question sit in his mind patiently waiting for when the answer would start to come.

[End of Chapter.]

[Quick fact: I still have no idea what the real name of the scout commander is. He won't tell me, only Garon knows and that knowledge has died with him.]